Algeria Mobilizing Troops on Malian Border Amid Hotel Hostage Crisis

The Algerian chief of staff has raised the alert level and mobilized the troops on the Malian border, after a hotel in the Malian capital Bamako was taken hostage by extremists, an Algerian official told Sputnik on Friday.

ALGERIA (Sputnik) – The Algerian army took part in an emergency meeting Friday, where the corresponding decision was made, the official said. The authorities also strengthened the border entry points with Mali after the attack.

"We await the terrorist attempts to enter Algeria from any region, so we have raised the alert level in all border regions. Since last Friday, we have had unconfirmed reports about terrorists possibly entering the country to carry out attacks in the south of the country, particularly this is related to oil objects," the official said.

Earlier in the day, several gunmen took scores of people hostage in the Radisson Blu Hotel in Mali's capital. According to French media, at least three people have been killed by the terrorists.

Mali has been in turmoil since 2012, when violent extremist tribes took control over large areas in northern Mali, and various Islamist groups, including the Boko Haram terrorist group, initiated operations in the country.

Hello,
!

We are committed to protecting your personal information and we have updated our Privacy Policy to comply with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a new EU regulation that went into effect on May 25, 2018.

Please review our Privacy Policy. It contains details about the types of data we collect, how we use it, and your data protection rights.

Since you already shared your personal data with us when you created your personal account, to continue using it, please check the box below:

I agree to the processing of my personal data for the purpose of creating a personal account on this site, in compliance with the Privacy Policy.

If you do not want us to continue processing your data, please click here to delete your account.

promotes the use of narcotic / psychotropic substances, provides information on their production and use;

contains links to viruses and malicious software;

is part of an organized action involving large volumes of comments with identical or similar content ("flash mob");

“floods” the discussion thread with a large number of incoherent or irrelevant messages;

violates etiquette, exhibiting any form of aggressive, humiliating or abusive behavior ("trolling");

doesn’t follow standard rules of the English language, for example, is typed fully or mostly in capital letters or isn’t broken down into sentences.

The administration has the right to block a user’s access to the page or delete a user’s account without notice if the user is in violation of these rules or if behavior indicating said violation is detected.